House of Sibling Love: This is Family
by TaliesinTaleweaver
Summary: So the Darkholme household is a little hectic, what with Anna Marie running wild while home alone with Kurt. The two siblings squabble over homework, television, and whose turn it is to make dinner. Note: except for a few specified stories, the House of Sibling Love series can be read in order that strikes your fancy.


Anna Marie sighed dramatically as she slammed the door. "And now," she said, grinning. "School is officially over for today. That's Wednesday, March 23, speaking of the Davis Middle School, worst school in Caldecott County. Yes, I repeat, everyone say it with me, _school is over._"

Kurt shook his head and edged past her, into the dining room. He pulled off his image-inducer and tossed it onto the counter. Anna Marie flung herself onto the sofa and grabbed the remote. "Let's see, cartoons coming up, are they?"

"No, they're not."

Anna Marie gawked at her brother. "Why not?"

Kurt pulled his science textbook out of his backpack. "Homework."

Anna Marie groaned. She didn't care much about school, or homework, and neither did her mother. Kurt and Anna Marie were school because it it drew too much attention if they weren't.

"You can do homework, I'm watching TV."

"Just keep the volume down."

"Go take a long walk off a short pier, why don't you," Anna Marie retorted benevolently, nestling into the sofa cushions and flipping through channels.

Fifteen minutes and thirty-two channels later, Anna Marie jumped up, bounced twice on the sofa and skipped over to Kurt.

"Let's go play some basketball. One on one. What do you say?"

"No. Homework."

"Aw, come _on_! Homework can wait."

"Nope. Homework comes first."

"Says who? Homework does not come first. Basketball comes first!"

"Not if you want to go to college."

"College is 'bout as useful as a trap door on a canoe."

"No, it's not."

"Don't that beat all," Anna Marie said in her patented announcer's voice, cupping her hands around her mouth to mimic a megaphone. "Kurt wants to go to college and fill up on book learnin'. He wants to—".

"Anna Marie!"

Anna Marie scowled at her brother. "Sorry, Kurtie boy. I'm going to make some cookies then."

"Whatever floats your boat. You have to eat them though, if and when you ruin them."

"I can make cookies very well! Mama says."

"Of course she does. She's your mama and you're her baby. I'm pretty sure mamas have to sign in blood that they will always agree that their little baby girls are the bestest at everything ever."

Anna Marie rolled her eyes and went to the kitchen. The cookie sheets were stacked on top of one another on a shelf just above her head. She stretched her arms up and reached for the stack. The entire pile crashed onto the floor loudly enough to wake the dead. Anna Marie slipped backwards and knocked her head against the refrigerator.

Kurt appeared in the middle of the room. "Anna Marie! What army's tearing this place up?" He grabbed her arm and pulled her to her feet. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Mama shouldn't stack them so high."

"Be more careful, all right?"

"Kurt, the knight in shining armor isn't supposed to tell the lady in distress to be more careful. He's _supposed_ to pick her up and teleport her to safety."

"Ha ha. No."

Anna Marie pushed her brown and white hair out of her face and started picking the pans up.

Kurt watched her, not offering to help. "Most people don't drop pans on their heads. At least pretend to be a normal girl, Anna Marie, okay? Would that be so hard?"

Anna Marie glared at him. "I don't have to pretend, Kurt. _I am_ normal."

Kurt smirked. "Yeah, well," he said, and teleported to the living room, leaving behind nothing but a whiff of sulphur.

Half an hour after Anna Marie stuck her cookies in the oven, she finished cleaning the flour up from the counter, and the melted butter that had spilled on the floor, and the plastic water jug that had somehow defied physics and exploded for no reason. She surveyed her work. The kitchen still didn't look like something from a magazine, but probably Mama wouldn't lecture her about it first thing when she got home.

"And now Anna Marie Darkholme, all the way from New Orleans, Louisiana, has just finished—" she stopped her monologue suddenly and ripped her apron off, balling it up and shoving it into a drawer. "Just finished her magnificent culinary preparations and is now ready to enjoy the fruit of her endeavors."

The timer on the counter went off at that moment and Anna Marie whooped. "Perfect timing!" She dumped the cookies on a plate and carried them into the living room, setting them on the coffee table with a flourish and throwing herself on the sofa, almost on top of Kurt, who was stretched out reading a book.

Kurt teleported to the table, grabbed a handful of cookies, and teleported back to the sofa.

"Hey!" Anna Marie cried. "Who said you could have any? Give me back my cookies!"

Kurt finished stuffing one into his mouth. "Can I?"

Anna Marie pouted. "You said I couldn't cook."

"Fine, I admit it before witnesses: you can cook. In fact, I think you can cook so well, you can make dinner tonight."

Anna Marie momentarily didn't know what to say in face of the sudden turn of events. She stared at Kurt, nonplussed, then shook her head. "_You_ make dinner. I made the cookies."

"What? How do you work that out? That's not fair."

Anna Marie gave him her best puppy face. "Pu–lease?"

Kurt sighed, teleporting onto the back of the couch. "Fine."

"Introducing Kurt T. Darkholme, best chef in Mississippi! His achievements are too numer—"

"All right, that's enough, shut up."

Anna Marie quieted, but only for about three seconds. "What's for dinner, O magnificent chef? I'm hungry enough to eat the north-end of a south-bound skunk."

Kurt grimaced. "I don't know. Go look in the refrigerator."

Anna Marie stuffed a cookie in her mouth and whisked herself into the kitchen, yanking the refrigerator open. "Lamb chops!" she sang out, loudly, spraying cookie crumbs. "Hot dogs!" She pulled another package out and read the label. "Ewww! Salmon! We're not having _that_ or I will puke it up all over you!"

"Put the chops out on the counter," Kurt called from the living room. "Then be quiet so I can finish my chapter. And oh, I forgot to mention, you're making the vegetables."

Anna Marie made a face. "That's child abuse."

Kurt snorted. "The only person in this situation that is being abused is me. I have to _live _with you."

Anna Marie bounded over to the sofa and put her arms around Kurt's waist. "But you really love me, sugar."

Kurt teleported away immediately to kitchen. "Sure." He flicked the radio on. Mozart filled the room.

"What!" Anna Marie yelped, running to the kitchen. "That's not music!"

"Yes it is. It's Mozart. Classical."

"No, that's funeral dirge." She sighed. "Hear ye, hear ye, all ye people of Mississippi! Fourteen-year-old Kurt Thomas Darkholme honestly thinks that Mozart actually composed music! Like, music that he _listens _to! Don't that put pepper in the gumbo!"

Kurt shook his head, taking a container of grated Parmesan cheese from the refrigerator. "Get me the bread crumbs, will you?"

Anna Marie handed them to Kurt. "Here you go, O valiant chef. How are you making them?"

"Your favorite way."

Anna Marie whooped. "Fried! I love fried pork chops!"

She grabbed two plates from the cupboard and flipped them haphazardly onto the table with a couple of forks. One of the forks missed the edge of the table and clattered onto the tile floor.

"I love fried foods," she sang out, in case Kurt had somehow missed that pertinent piece of information.

"You ought to be fat as a hog all the fried stuff you eat."

Anna Marie shook her head. "Naw, I get too good a workout fighting Cody most every week. And beating his fat hide, too."

"You fight too much."

"Not my fault. It should be illegal for boys like Cody to be in the public school system. It's like going to school with a gorilla. There's nothing to do _but_ fight."

"We've lived here for less than a year. How is it that you already have four life-long enemies?"

"I only have _one_. The other three are Cody's lackeys and I don't have anything 'gainst them, personally."

Kurt said with forced patience, "You're supposed to be making the vegetables, Anna Marie."

"I _did._"

"Really? When? Was it when I blinked just a second ago?"

"Ha ha, very funny. You should grow up and be a comedian. Before school. I knew you'd make me do it, so I made them and stuck them in the fridge."

"What did you make?"

"Ah, now _that's_ a surprise."

Kurt dumped the lamb chops on a plate and teleported to the table. "Bring whatever it is you made, grab the rolls and let's eat."

Anna Marie took a bag of rolls from the breadbox and dropped it on the counter. "You come get the bread, Kurt, you lazy sack of bones. You're the teleporter."

She took a pie tin from the refrigerator and plopped it on the table, pulling the foil off with a flourish.

Kurt glared at her. "That's not vegetables. That's a pie."

Anna Marie slid into her seat. "So? It's sweet potato. Potatoes are vegetables."

"No, potatoes are starches."

Anna Marie poked her tongue out at him. "What, are you _not_ going to eat it or something?"

Anna Marie took her fork and speared a lamb chop, taking a bite from it before putting it on her plate. "Hey, Kurt?" She cut the pie into thirds and put one of them on her plate.

"Yes?"

"Do you ever, I dunno, want to run away with a circus?"

"No."

"But don't you think that would fun?" Anna Marie persisted. "You could do your teleporting tricks and everybody'd clap and cheer and the circus master would say, '_Ladieez and Gentlemen,_'" She jumped to her feet, strutting around the room with her chest puffed out like a penguin. "I am prouuuud to introduce the one, the only, the incredible—" she paused just a moment before coming up with the name, "Nightcrawler!" She gestured toward him dramatically.

Kurt chuckled. "You're a crazy kid. And a nightcrawler is a worm, anyway. Why would I call myself a worm?"

Anna Marie shook her head. "No, it's not a worm. It's because you're dark and look like a demon—I mean, like something that would be creeping around in the dark. So: Nightcrawler."

"Oh, thank you, Anna Marie. I look like a demon. That's a very nice thing to say. I should have that put on my tombstone. 'Here lies Kurt Darkholme, who looked like a demon.'"

Anna Marie sighed. "I didn't mean it like that, even if you _do_. And it's still better than being me. You can teleport, Mama can look like whatever she wants. Then there's me. I have white hair, yippee ki yay. That's almost as exciting as the fact that I can walk on my own two feet."

"Yes, life's very fair like that. We're a family, and I look like a demon and you can walk on your two feet, so we've got that going for us. It's a start."

Anna Marie giggled. "Don't forget, I can make a mean sweet potato pie too. And beat up Cody Robbins. Oh, and you can maybe lecture someone about Mozart."

"_Anna Marie_!"


End file.
